anyways, there was a slickdeal for a $20 shredder. i contemplated buying that, but really with the amount of junk mail i have, i’m pretty sure i’d kill that $20 shredder within a week…

and then i read this post on the forums:

You’re going to want to spend a minimum of 800 dollars on a paper shredder. Any less than that and the quality is going to be so low you’ll want to replace the damn thing within 5 years, but you won’t be able to because your identity will have been stolen and your bank account emptied.

If you’re serious about shredding, get something with carbide cutting heads and at least a .5HP motor. I have a Rawlings-Chamberlain MK220 AKA “The Silver Knight” .
It comes fully loaded with a dual rubber roller feeder and 6 layer hopper to separate different kinds of paper, wood, metal, etc.. I can shred a New York telephone book in under 15 seconds.
The built in milling computer lets me customize the shred pattern to meet any security needs. I prefer a 3mm parallelogram with bilateral fiber separation. You can’t even make out individual characters on those things.

Send me an IM if you’re serious about this. Welcome to the world of paper shredding. You’re in for a hell of a ride.

HAHAHHAHAH… this guy is awesome. if he’s making this stuff up, i love the attention to detail. if he’s not making this stuff up, wow.

entire thread here: http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1903644

that’s SIX medals! all in one evening!

and ohno, celski, and US short track relay team qualifying!

i don’t know why i become so patriotic when it comes to the olympics! it’s got to be all the american biased olympic commentary i grew up with!

there are a few more odd sponsorships as well. i wish i were rich enough to sponsor the US olympic team!

a few nights ago, i saw the VISA commercial where they showcased some russian athlete and ended with the tagline “Go world!” heck no! i’m all about the US of A! none of that “Go world” business! USA needs to beat those commies otherwise, we lose the cold war!! jk

in any case, i was liveIMing with julie. basically flooding her with my thoughts and reactions to the olympics (because she had asked if i was going to liveblog.) and we got into a discussion about the music for ice skating. i feel it was kind of lame and cheesy and melodramatic. the subject of costume also came up (“what about those galaxy quest costumes”? nice.) the artistic costumes are so overdone. i want to see an ice skater just show up in whatever.

today i read an article on the washingtonpost about the music choice. my favorite quote is: “Increasingly popular, too, are film scores. ‘Film scores have no rhythm,’ Hurwitz says. ‘It’s just mood music, not meant to be choreographed. But they do it anyway, because they liked the movie [and can] wear a funky costume.’” hahha, i love how he brings up the funky costumes!

i think i should be a choreographer. here are some of my ideas:

• let’s go to the mall… on ice. there are some amazing dance moves in there that should translate well to ice. costumes – robot costume? bedazzled jean jackets?
• bohemian rhapsody. that song goes through so many different moods/tempos.. it’s like many songs in one! you have the fast part where they can be building up into a jump and then slower parts where they can do the nancy kerrigan glide (michelle kwan also known for this…)
• rodeo. beef! it’s what’s for dinner! same reason as bohemian rhapsody… lots of stuff to work with. plus, it’s classical so you can appeal to the more traditional judges. actually, i do wonder if anyone has choreographed to this song before because it really isn’t that bad! but i would propose they dress up in cowboy getup.

i love the olympics! i get so excited every time! i love the parade of athletes even though it’s just a bunch of people walking in. i like guessing how many athletes each country has.

but these opening ceremonies? sucked in my opinion. i always rag on canadia… and these opening ceremonies didn’t do much other than to give me more things to make fun of canada for. i felt like they stole from other countries… with the whole irish jig/tap dancing/clogging bit. batman (guy with the funky hair) playing the fiddle was amusing mostly because they had him fiddling in front of a moon thereby creating a bat signal like silhouette. and then having k.d. lang sing the song from shrek? i didn’t see how it fit into the mood of things. finally… the choices in artists. WHERE WAS CELINE DION?! u had joni mitchell (only heard of her), bryan adams (everything i do… i do it for youuuuuu), and sarah maclachan, but no celine dion?! or barenaked ladies?! and then there was the guy who just stood there on the platform and spoke. at first, i got excited when the announcer said that something about youtube and you saw a single person on a platform… my hopes were high that it might be robin sparkles… instead it was a guy telling me “canada is the what in what’s new”. really???

note: i did think they had the tough task of one-upping beijing’s opening ceremony. which is very unfair, because no one’s ever going to have the same budget as they did and plus, china was ridiculous with their prep (there were stories about people getting hurt from too much practice right?) so i’m partially joking… but also not, because i didn’t find it that entertaining…

i think like 4 years ago, i did a 101 list… i’m just going to make a list of things i want to do during snowstorms this winter. we’ve already had one, about to have another, and supposedly there’s another one midweek next week so i should have lots of time to get everything done.

1. finish reading books – green revolution, dexter
2. practice more guitar. not guitar hero. real guitar.
3. finish organizing all my files
4. start that nerdy project i’ve been wanting to start for some time now…
5. finish an online project i’ve been putting off… this one’s got a due date of march!

supposedly the plan is for NASA to invest in space technology research and pay private companies to develop the technologies instead of doing it themselves. NASA outsourcing!!

i don’t know how much it costs to send a man to the moon. i imagine it’s pretty expensive. so those private companies that millionaires pay to get them into space… they might not be making a profit when they charge millions for the ride. but i wonder if in the future, if NASA is going to end up having to pay a private company a fortune each time (after all, those companies have to be able to make money too so they won’t be charging at just cost) they try to send someone to space. if it’s just going to be spending more money later (to buy private companies), i’d rather NASA just keep its own program and forget funding private companies.

does that make me less capitalist? i think i’m just biased because i’ve always loved space and astronauts and going to the moon, etc. etc.

usa today article: Do you use more energy than your neighbors?

some amusing comments:

• “turned on every light and electrical device in my home and cranked my AC on full blast with the windows opened last earth day. I’ll do it again this year.” hahaha
• people saying everyone’s going to start to go angry mob on the neighbors that use more electricity… uh, the report is only for yourself and won’t reveal the exact neighbor who uses more than you. similarly, you won’t be revealed as the energy hoard of the neighborhood so you don’t have to worry about the angry mob showing up at your door.
• “My house is smaller than my neighbors, plus thay have a bigger family. Course my bill will be lower.” Other people asking if their 32984923 kids will be factored into the comparison… teenagers using more electricity than a small village, etc.

if you read the description in the article, the reports aren’t a means for you to police your neighbors’ usage. but it’s to help you get a gauge of your own usage. cars report their MPG, but for home energy, it’s a lot harder to get a gauge of your usage. you can compare it to your previous year’s bill, but what if last Feb was unseasonably warm and this year is unseasonably cold?

now there’s not much musically that i can usually comment on as an expert. but if there’s ONE thing i’ve mastered during my many years of school orchestra… it is faking violin bowing!! in my humble opinion, fake violin bowing requires the same, if not more, skill as actually playing the violin! as when you play the violin for real, you need to make sure your bow is going in the same direction as everyone else. timing wise, you need to make sure that you pull your bow at the correct rate… otherwise, u’ll be on your up stroke when people are still going down! then, the angle at which you bow matters. you can’t be stroking the E string (angled upwards) when everyone else is on the G string (angled downwards)! finally, if you’re faking it, you need to make sure you don’t actually hit the string! otherwise, you might actually make a bad sound (not even joking here… my middle school orchestra teacher complained about the sound coming from my violin. he blamed it on my strings and “cheap” fiberglass bow. no… it was definitely the operator, not the equipment!!)

so when i saw them start their songs by air violin bowing… i was not impressed. their speeds were not matching! they were not in sync! it was terrible!! butchering the art of fake violin playing! i was outraged!

p.s. i feel like all dude acapella sounds better than all girl… and heck, even better than coed. my 2 favorites are the bubs and nota. man, they make every song sound awesome.